Chapter 69: Not Easily Seen

The next morning, Liam Howard first dropped Josie Kwan off near her home, then leisurely enjoyed a nearby breakfast. Checking that the time was right, he headed straight for the headquarters of Cheung Kong Holdings.

At the company, with Vice General Manager Su Zhixue holding down the fort, almost all routine matters could be well handled now that there were no major crises.

The headquarters of Cheung Kong Holdings was located in China Building.

This skyscraper had just been completed by Cheung Kong Holdings earlier that year, after which the group's headquarters had relocated from Cheung Kong Building on King's Road to China Building.

Therefore, Cheung Kong Holdings had actually only been moved into this new headquarters for a few months.

Seeing Liam arrive so early, Li Ka-shing was quite surprised.

The transaction proceeded very smoothly. After all, Li Ka-shing had absolute authority over Cheung Kong Holdings; since he said they were selling Green Island Cement shares, naturally no one would object.

Besides, buying at a little over five dollars and selling at six dollars was a profitable deal no matter how one looked at it.

In the end, Cheung Kong Holdings successfully sold the 3.915 million shares of Green Island Cement it held to Liam.

In return, Liam paid 23.49 million Hong Kong dollars for the acquisition.

Following this, his available capital dropped from over 110 million Hong Kong dollars to around 90 million Hong Kong dollars.

However, his stake in Green Island Cement increased to 15.374 million shares, accounting for 30.7% of the company.

Once the transaction was concluded, Liam returned to his company and saw that everything was running normally, with the stock traders operating in an orderly fashion under Su Zhixue's supervision.

By now, the movements of Green Island Cement in the stock market had become glaringly obvious. With such frequent stock trading over the past month or so, their board of directors must have been well aware of it. Yet, the Green Island Cement board had remained completely silent, which showed that the chairman of the board truly had no intention of increasing his stock holdings.

Sitting in his office, Liam placed a call to the Chairman of the Board of Green Island Cement, Harilela Centurion.

When he was gathering information on Green Island Cement, he had long since obtained the contact details of this chairman.

"Hello, this is Green Island Cement. I am Harilela." Judging by the voice on the other end, it sounded like an elderly man.

Indeed, Harilela Centurion was already sixty-five years old that year.

"Hello, Mr. Harilela. I am Liam Howard from Global Investment Company," Liam introduced himself first.

"Global Investment Company? Liam Howard?" The person on the other end clearly paused for a moment, unable to place who Liam might be.

"Mr. Harilela must be well aware of the massive movements in Green Island Cement's stock market over the past month or so," Liam said with a smile. "The person behind all this commotions is yours truly. Having now become a major shareholder of Green Island Cement, I would like to have a chat with you."

At this stage, he no longer feared exposing his accumulation of Green Island Cement shares; otherwise, he wouldn't have instructed Su Zhixue and the team to step up their share acquisitions.

To Liam's surprise, the response from the other end of the line was eerily calm: "Mr. Howard, I'll be waiting for you in my office at the Green Island Cement headquarters!"

"Great, see you shortly!"

"OK!"

With Su Zhixue managing Global Investment Company, Liam had nothing to worry about and departed the office once again.

"Young Master, where are we heading?" Li Weiguo asked from the driver's seat, turning his head back.

"To Hung Hom. I'll direct you once we get closer," Liam replied directly.

His destination was none of other than the headquarters of Green Island Cement.

The Green Island Cement headquarters was located in Hung Hom, practically adjacent to the Whampoa Dock and the China Light & Power Hok Yuen Power Station.

Back when Green Island Cement relocated from Macau to Hong Kong, it had cooperated with Whampoa Dock on land reclamation to finally build the current Green Island Cement plant.

However, during the 1960s, due to the heavy cement dust generated by the plant which caused significant environmental issues for the city, a portion of the factory buildings was demolished.

These demolished sections were directly redeveloped into three commercial towers: the Pao Ping Building, the Tsingtao Building, and the Green Island Building.

Liam's destination this time was the Green Island Building, the headquarters office tower of the Green Island Cement Company.

About twenty minutes later, the Mercedes-Benz smoothly arrived below the Green Island Building.

"Good morning, Miss. I am here to see your company's Chairman. Could you please announce me?" Liam asked directly at the ground floor reception desk of the Green Island Building, addressing a blonde Caucasian receptionist sitting behind the counter.

Green Island Cement was a British-funded enterprise. While the ordinary frontline workers at the bottom were all Chinese, Liam noticed that the staff in this office tower were predominantly Caucasian, with hardly any Chinese faces to be seen.

Observing this situation, he resolved that once he took control of Green Island Cement, he would replace them with a loyal team of Chinese employees. As for these Caucasians, he would only keep those with sufficient competence; otherwise, they should not blame him for carrying out a thorough purge.

After all, once he became the actual controller of Green Island Cement, the company would naturally be run according to his will, rather than the whims of these foreigners.

"Sir, do you have an appointment? If you don't have an appointment, I'm terribly sorry, but our Chairman is not someone anyone can just meet." Seeing that Liam was quite young, the blonde Caucasian receptionist felt a sense of contempt, and her attitude became very dismissive.

Green Island Cement was Hong Kong's largest cement manufacturing and sales enterprise, so many real estate developers collaborated with them, and heavyweights from the property sector frequently came to see their chairman.

However, the vast majority of those visitors were older individuals, mostly at least forty or fifty years old.

A young Chinese man in his early twenties like Liam, in her eyes, was certainly no important figure capable of calling the shots, and therefore utterly unqualified to see their chairman.

Liam frowned. Could someone like this really be working as a company receptionist?

She was simply tarnishing the image of the Green Island Cement Company.

The reception desk, serving as the primary facade of a company, had a clear and vital responsibility: to greet every visiting guest in a friendly and professional manner.

Yet the Caucasian young woman before him not only failed to exhibit the warmth and respect expected of her role, but instead exuded a condescending air of superiority—something that completely violated the core principles of front desk hospitality.

"I have already made an appointment with your Chairman. If you call him, you will naturally find out. Just tell him that Liam Howard has arrived," Liam said, suppressing his patience as he had no intention of bickering endlessly with her.

Anyway, once he became the helmsman of the company, this receptionist would certainly not be allowed to continue working here.

Though still somewhat skeptical about whether Liam really had an appointment with the boss, she eventually decided to place a call to the Chairman's office.

"Mr. Howard has arrived? Good, I understand. Please guide him up to my office—no, wait, never mind, I'll go down to welcome him myself. Miss Sally, please receive Mr. Howard for a moment, I will be right there." On the other end of the line, the Chairman's voice carried a hint of urgency.

Hearing this, the receptionist froze instantly, her face painted with sheer disbelief.

She had never seen the Chairman attach such importance to any visitor; the urgency in that phone call was unmistakable.

If that was the case, her attitude toward him just now had been so appalling...

At that moment, the receptionist began to panic.